


Call My Name And Save Me From The Dark

by Saoirse_Laochra



Category: X-Men, X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Mental Health Issues, Mentions of other characters - Freeform, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Past Child Abuse, Past Experimentation, Rape/Non-con Elements, Scott Summers Crappy Childhood, Scott/Jean Slow Burn, Some Xavier bashing, Some appearances of other characters, Xaiver doesn't exactly help
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-11-30
Packaged: 2018-12-11 14:46:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 14,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11716557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saoirse_Laochra/pseuds/Saoirse_Laochra
Summary: It took Jean a while to realize exactly what drew her to the thin boy, with his hair too long, his face turned down in a perpetual frown, and constantly mumbling. Something about him pulled her in, and by the time she realized what it was, she’d taken a peak under that hard façade, and seen glimpses of the boy inside.Scott Summers trying to recover from his nightmare of a childhood... With a certain red-headed telepath by his side.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So the misunderstood tragedy that is Scott Summers grabbed a hold of my plot bunnies, and bolted. This idea's been rattling around for several days now, and I just started putting... fingers to keys? I guess? Can't really say pen to paper. But regardless...
> 
> A note on the canon: I'm blending bits of several comic lines, pieces of the movies, and some of my own interpretations in here. 
> 
> MIND THE WARNINGS: This takes place after all the badness happens, but there are repeated mentions, traumatic nightmares and flashbacks, mentions of the badness, and so on. Experimentation on children -bordering on, if not outright torture - physical, mental, and emotional abuse, and so on abound in this. Yee've been warned.

It took Jean a while to realize exactly what drew her to the thin boy, with his hair too long, his face turned down in a perpetual frown, and constantly mumbling. Something about him pulled her in, and by the time she realized what it was, she’d already fallen far to deep to pull herself back out.

It wasn’t that Scott Summers was mean; out of all the words to describe Scott, mean wouldn’t even be at the bottom of the list. He was quiet, only speaking to the others if he was spoken to, and even then, it was usually a short yes or no response. Anything that required more than that usually only merited a shrug. He spent most of his time sitting in the large oak tree in the center of the back yard (or at least, Jean called it the back yard -the actual ‘back yard’ apparently went back well over a hundred acres), listening to tapes on his Walkman.

Oh sure, he was attractive, in a way. Underneath the grungy clothes he wore, and the hair that he constantly let fall over his face, he looked like Matt Lawrence; he could have easily been some sort of model. But Jean had never really cared about looks -her tastes tended to run towards short, stocky, rough looking boys -not pretty boys. And Scott Summers was definitely a pretty boy.

But something about him drew her towards him, like a moth to the flame. Almost without thinking, she found herself gravitating towards him, like the moon caught in the earth’s pull. When he curled up in a chair in the back living room (the one the kids were given as their de facto ‘play room’), listening to his Walkman, she would find herself pulling away from the others’ board games or TV shows, and sitting closer to him. Not actually close -he’d move away if she did that, but the chair a few feet away, curled up with her book.

When they had free time outside, she’d find herself doing her homework under the tree he sat in, or answering letters from home. At dinner, she unconsciously moved closer and closer, disrupting the agreed upon seats, until she was a mere two chairs away from him -but a good six chairs away from everyone else.

It took almost six months before the quiet, anti-social boy finally talked to her.

 

* * *

 

Jean crumpled up the letter, feeling the tears coming to her eyes. Swiping them away angrily, she threw the wadded up piece of paper as far away from her as she could.

“Do, uh… do you need… someone to, um… to talk to?”

Glancing up, she saw Scott had taken his headphones off, and was -sort of -looking down at her, without actually looking at her.

“I’m… Sorry, I’ll just uh… leave you… alone, I guess, sorry.”

“No, wait!” Jean said quickly, her voice stopping him as he went to put his headphones back on. “I would… I would really appreciate that. Do you mind if I come up?”

He shook his head slowly, chewing on his bottom lip as he did. “Do you… do you need help?”

Jean grinned despite her poor mood, and shook her head as she levitated herself up next to him.

“Nope. I’m the best tree climber in the world,” She said with a small laugh.

“That’s cheating.”

Jean looked over at Scott, surprised at the playful tone of his voice. Almost instantly though, he dropped his head again, staring at the ground.

“Wow,” She said after a few minutes of silence. “This is a great view. You can see the whole yard from up here.”

Scott nodded. “Yeah. And if you look… right there? See that?”

Jean followed his finger, peering at the window he was pointing at, before laughing.

“Is that… Oh my god. What is he listening to?” She asked, nearly doubling over in laughter.

Scott shrugged, a small smile on his face. “Don’t know. But apparently it makes him feel like moving to the beat.”

They sat quietly, watching as Dr. McCoy waved his arms around, feet moving to music they couldn’t hear, dancing wildly in his room, before Scott finally shifted on the branch he was sitting on.

“So… bad news from home?”

Jean could feel her face falling, the reminder bringing it all flooding back.

“Oh, man, I… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean… I didn’t want you to… I’m sorry. Sorry,” Scott mumbled, his voice nearly a whisper.

“No, it’s… There’s nothing to be sorry for. It’s just… my mom’s letter… You’re going to think it’s stupid,” She said, sniffling a bit to try and keep the tears from escaping.

“No, I won’t,” Came the instant response. “Promise.”

“It’s… My cat. I know how it sounds but… Spooky was older than I was -my folks got him about two years before I was born. He slept with me every night, for as long as I can remember. And I guess… last week… He got hit crossing the road. My mom said there was nothing they could do. And they buried him in the backyard, under the tree he liked to climb, but I just…”

She stopped, unable to say anymore, as the tears cascaded down her face. Embarrassed, she ducked her head down in her folded arms, hoping Scott hadn’t seen how red her face had gotten.

She was surprised when she felt a hand, awkward and unsure, rest on her shoulder.

“I don’t think it’s dumb. I wasn’t… I couldn’t have…”

Jean peaked her head out, glancing over at Scott, who seemed to be struggling for words, the hand on her shoulder twitching. They sat like that for maybe thirty seconds, before he seemed to pull himself back under control.

“I never had a pet,” He said, as if he hadn’t stopped speaking, as if he hadn’t been shaking badly enough to nearly fall from the tree. “But if I did… I’d like to think that… that they’d be like… like family. And… it’s… it’s normal to get upset when… when bad things… when bad things… when your family gets hurt.” He paused, taking a deep breath, before continuing, in a much steadier voice, “It’s not stupid at all. I think it makes you a really… a really good person.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos, and the lovely comments from redsnood, Kookykrumbs, and Jugal.
> 
> I know this is still a bit... stilted -drawn out. But the good stuff is coming next chapter, when things pick up and start running. : )
> 
> Thanks again

They had sat, in a comfortable silence, in the tree until the Professor’s telepathic ‘dinner’ reminder went out to all the students. With a sigh, Jean shakily levitated herself to the ground, glancing up at Scott with an embarrassed smile.

“I’d offer to help you, but… my control isn’t all that great,” She said apologetically. "You'd probably be better off trying to climb down with a broken leg than trusting me to do it."

A flash of… _something_ , she wasn’t sure what, passed over his face as he looked into the distance. “No, it’s… it’s fine. Really. I got up, I can get down,” He muttered, before shimmying down the tree quickly, and landing beside her.

As they walked back towards the mansion, Jean couldn’t help but think about the look he’d had when she’d offered to help him down, the look she couldn’t quite place. Which was odd, because...

With a jolt, she realized _why_ it was odd.

“I don't  _hear_ you!”

Scott dropped into a crouch, one hand flying to the red glasses he was never seen without, at her sharp outcry.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t… I didn’t mean to startle you,” Jean said, unable to keep the excitement from her voice. “But… I don't  _hear_ you!”

Red-faced, Scott straightened, shoving his hands deep in his pockets. “The hell’s that mean?” He mumbled, steadily avoiding looking at her.

“What? No, I mean… Obviously I can _hear you_ , hear you. But… Oh, man, I’ve gotta find the professor! This is amazing!”

With that, she darted off, feet barely touching the ground as she ran, leaving a stony-faced Scott in her wake.

 

* * *

 

“Professor? Professor!”

 _Professor, where are you_? Jean demanded, sending her thoughts out as loud as she could, directing them towards the only other telepath in the house.

She could _feel_ his wince of pain, and felt a momentary twinge of guilt; she’d just done the equivalent of screaming full volume in his ear. But her guilt was short lived, excitement quickly pushing everything else aside.

_Professor, I have to talk to you!_

_I’m in my study, Jean. And please... unless it's an emergency... don't do that again._

She ignored the second half of the message, running full speed, to the foyer, and up the large ornate staircase, barely taking the time to stop and open the door at the end of the hallway as she burst into the Professor’s study.

“Professor,” She blurted out breathlessly. “My powers… I’m getting… better at… controlling them!”

Xavier smiled gently at her. “Really? While I’ve seen marked improvement in your abilities, Jean, I’m curious why you’re only now realizing it.”

“I was… Well, I mean… I was reading a letter from home, about my cat –“

“Your cat?” Xavier interrupted, his voice curious.

“Yeah. He… well, it doesn’t really matter, but I was feeling really down, and Scott was there, and we… sort of visited, I guess, or at least we talked, and I realized I couldn’t hear his thoughts!” She finished in a rush. “Professor? What’s wrong?”

She’d expected the Professor to react with joy to the news; after all, she’d been working on her control since she’d arrived at the school six months ago. She was constantly bombarded by the errant, stray thoughts of the other students when she first arrived, and had only recently acquired enough control to actively shut them out when she focused on doing so. The fact that her control had gotten good enough to tune a student out, without her actively trying, was great news. Without putting any thought into it, she simply didn't hear Scott's thoughts.

But Professor Xavier looked… hesitant. Almost disappointed.

“Jean… While I hate to… _discourage_ you,” He started, obviously choosing his words with care, “Your inability to hear Scott’s thoughts… Well, it has nothing to do with you.”

“What? No! I mean… He’s not a telepath, is he? You said I was the only telepath here, and –“

“No, my dear girl. He’s not a telepath.”

“Then why can’t I hear him?” She demanded. “How come he’s the only person, other than you, that I don’t have to focus to keep them out of my head?”

“Because, Jean… I’ve… It’s a rather complicated story. But you mustn’t _dig_ at this, do you understand? You _mustn’t_ try and get in his head. I fear the consequences would be dire… for _both_ of you. I want you to promise me, Jean. Promise that you won’t go poking around where you shouldn’t.”

“But –“

“No ‘ _buts_ ’, Jean. I must insist. You are still learning how to control your abilities, and Scott… Let us just say that there are some minds that are figurative mine fields; minds I wouldn’t wish on anyone. There are places where even _I_ fear to tread -and that should tell you something.”

"I… Of course, Professor. Sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt you. I uh… Guess I'll just go get dinner.”

 

* * *

 

“You realize she’s not going to listen?”

Charles sighed, rubbing at his temples, avoiding looking at Hank; in her excitement, Jean hadn’t noticed him sitting in the high-backed chair in front of the desk.

“Of course she won’t listen. In her defense, I wouldn’t have listened either,” He muttered, glaring at the papers on his desk. Being around children was far more difficult than he'd thought it would be -even though the vast majority of students were well-behaved, excellent examples of good children, Charles was living in a house with over a dozen teenage mutants.

“So why _can’t_ she hear him? She seems to hear everything else,” Hank said, perhaps a bit unkindly, but Charles couldn’t particularly blame him for it. Hank was an open book, even for the weakest of telepaths -and Jean was no weakling. Multiple times, she’d responded to things that Hank hadn’t said, but thought -leading to some rather embarrassing situations.

He almost chuckled at the memory of one particular incident… before the issue at hand pushed its way to the forefront of his mind again.

“Because I built a wall in Scott's mind.”

“A wall. Does he… know about this… wall?” Hank asked slowly, trying and failing to keep the suspicion out of his voice.

Charles steepled his fingers together, looking out the window to the courtyard to give himself a moment to think. From his vantage point, he could see the remains of the large oak tree, the one planted almost a hundred and fifty years ago. The one that was now little more than a charred stump.

“Hank… You remember when Scott first arrived here, yes?” When the man nodded, rather angrily, he continued, “You don’t know the half of what happened to him. What the boy went through… it left _psychic_ wounds, as terrible, or perhaps even worse than the physical ones. And those wounds broadcasted as loud and clear as a radio. While you might not have consciously known what you were feeling, I’m sure you still felt… _uncomfortable_ … in his presence.”

Hank sheepishly rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. “I thought it was because of… well… _you know_.”

“It wasn't. My suspicion is those psychic wounds were what drew the mutant Winters to him in the first place; even for as weak a telepath as he was, I believe that Winters could feel that -and knew he could manipulate that pain.

"While Scott isn’t a telepath, whatever happened to him, it was going to keep sending out that feeling. To assure his safety -and the safety of any telepathic students -I simply… _dulled_ … that pain somewhat. I erected a wall in his mind that protects him from the worst of those wounds, and blunted the psychic scream he was sending out.”

"Without his permission."

Charles sighed. "Do you have any better ideas? If you do, I would desperately love to hear them."


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few things on this chapter. Firstly, I know this is a weird style, a bit different from the previous chapters. That's how they will pretty much always be written when they're from Scott's perspective. Secondly, thanks to all the lovely comments, and kudos; they make my day, and I love hearing from folks. If there's anything you want to make sure I touch on, any particular scenes you'd like to see, etc., feel free to let me know. If you liked, disliked, had muses run off, I'd love to hear it. I'll discuss character concepts, plots, and muses until the cows come home (sad to say, I'm a closest nerd).

Scott stared, probably longer than he should have, watching Jean run towards the house, as a turmoil of emotions started building in his chest.

Part of him was busy calling himself an idiot; what had he expected? Jean Grey was _easily_ the prettiest girl in New York, and so far out of his league, they weren’t even playing the same freaking game. He was the weird kid, the freak with the glasses, and _his too long hair, and his ratty clothes that he refused to let the professor replace, and his music too loud, and_

He shouldn’t have even looked at her, much less actually _talked_ to her.

But he’d _noticed_. She was always around him. Whenever they were in a general vicinity, she somehow always ended up near him. She’d pull away from the others, and -while she wouldn’t talk to him, _or touch him, or yell, or scream or_

She seemed to want to be near him. So when he’d seen her tears, he just couldn’t stop himself.

And it’d went… sort of okay? At least, she hadn’t seemed too upset, or disgusted, or angry. She hadn’t jerked away, or swatted him when he set his hand on her shoulder -something that had him sweating bullets just thinking about it. She’d sat up in his tree with him for… damn, he wasn’t sure - _he had to start focusing, Xavier told him, he had to make a concentrated effort to start noticing time, he couldn’t just space out anymore, not at the school, it wasn’t good for anybody, and he was safe and didn’t need to do_

But then she’d ran off, leaving him behind, saying that she couldn’t hear him. Which didn’t make any sense, because as all the students knew, Jean could hear _everything_ , even the things she wasn’t meant to hear.

Except for _him_ , apparently. Which, he supposed, was sort of a good thing. His mind was one big nasty ball of screwed-up; if she could actually hear his thoughts, she’d probably run screaming for a shower, horrified that she’d let him touch her. Even the Professor had stopped probing into his mind, and their therapy sessions were only verbal these days, after a particularly bad session that ended with both him and the Professor looking like they’d run two marathons back to back, and left Scott with nightmares for a week, waking screaming from

Her quick departure had… hurt? Maybe that was the word he was looking for. It didn’t seem to adequately describe how he was feeling, but it worked he supposed. He’d tried not to get his hopes up, failed miserably at that, and really, he had been expecting something like that to happen anyways, so it wasn’t like it actually mattered.

He trudged his way inside, carefully avoiding the other students darting into the hallway, making his way into the large dining room, ducking to the side to avoid the other students running through the halls.

The table -easily one of the biggest things in the entire house -could comfortably seat fifty people according to the Professor, although why somebody would ever need to feed that many people, or why they’d all have to sit at that one table, never failed to boggle Scott’s mind.

But in the same sense, he was grateful for the gigantic monstrosity; it allowed him to sit far enough away from the other students that he didn’t have to worry about any of them talking to him, or asking him questions, or yell or scream or punch or

He always quietly waited, in the background, until the others had gotten their plates, and taken their seats before he went through the food line himself, trying to avoid the loud, raucous mob of other students, laughing and talking at decibels that threatened to make his head explode.

Today was no different; he watched as Bobby and Warren charged through the line, pushing and shoving each other playfully, causing eyerolls in Kitty and Jubilee, as they chattered and laughed, and Kitty took sideways glances at Bobby out of the corner of her eye when she thought no one was looking, with Warren stealing looks at her. Dr. McCoy picked his way carefully through the crowd, careful of his size, even though he wasn’t seven foot tall and blue, like he couldn’t get used to being human sized again -even though human size for him was still pretty damn tall. Ororo strode gracefully through the chaos, walking as if she owned the place, the way she always did, as if all the laughter and playing was beneath her -out of everyone, she was the only one who kept to herself almost as much as Scott did. Kurt bounced back and forth, like an overeager puppy trying to get all the attention from everyone, making a general fool of himself to get laughs from the others. Jean, to his disappointment, was conspicuously absent.

He’d picked up on the others’ little quirks quickly; he noticed the drama before those involved even did. He knew that Warren was trying to hide his jealousy at Bobby, who was oblivious to the whole thing, and seemed to enjoy chasing the local girls he met on the weekends in town, which made Kitty jealous. Jubilee seemed to think the whole thing was stupid, rolling her eyes whenever Kitty got pouty about it. Ororo disliked both of the boys, but to be fair, she seemed to have a thing against any sort of goofing off, or anything not related to school, or training. Kurt wasn’t nearly as dumb -or ignorant of American customs -as he liked to pretend he was, usually to get sympathy, or free stuff and adventures from the other students.

Dr. McCoy was nice enough -he occasionally let Scott tinker around with the broken electronics he kept in the storeroom attached to his lab -but Scott knew he made him uncomfortable, like he wasn’t sure how to act, or what to say around him, which -in turn -made Scott uncomfortable, and nervous, waiting for the first blow to fall or the kick from that massive blue foot to launch him through a wall, or a punch to the head from one of those meaty fists, or

He grabbed his food, keeping a cautious eye on the others as they sat down, still chattering on about their day, and what they had planned now that the weekend was here (Warren and Bobby were going to the movies that night, while Kurt hung out with the girls for their annual ‘Friday Fun Day’, where they spent most of the night doing their nails, and putting mud on their faces for some reason).

It made him feel a bit better that none of them mentioned going home for the weekend; he knew several of them did, regularly -Kitty went home Thursday night, every other weekend, and Warren usually spent at least a couple days a month home -but it seemed like all of them were going to be hanging around the house.

Which, to be fair, wasn’t exactly ideal for Scott; he’d liked it better when he was the only teenager in the house, and the only areas he’d had to avoid to avoid people were the Professor’s study, and Hank’s lab. But conversely, hearing them talk about going home, and spending time with their families always sent a pang of regret and jealousy through him.

He’d had a home once too (even if he couldn’t remember most of it, like the colors of his walls, or their yard), and a family (despite the fact that he couldn’t remember the color of his mom’s hair, if his dad had a beard or not, or what his little brother actually looked like). It seemed like a lifetime ago, maybe a dream or a fantasy he’d made up while he was

He sat down at the far end of the table, forcing himself to keep from wrapping his free arm around his bowl. The Professor had said he needed to start working on some of his… leftover mannerisms, including acting like somebody was going to constantly steal his food. But it was hard, even though he knew nobody would touch his bowl, or plate, and even if they did, there was always enough food to feed a small army (which there sort of was), but it didn’t matter; the Professor had asked him to start there, and so he tried to remember to keep his right arm under the table while he ate.

He had to start somewhere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For reference: The jumps and skips are intentional, not a result of me losing focus, or pieces of the story missing.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the lovely comments, and kudos! They make my day. : )

Jean sat down next to Scott, ignoring his startled look as she set her bowl on the table.

“Hi. Sorry about running off like that earlier. I got a little excited,” She said in way of explanation.

He stared at her for another moment, his mouth frozen on the bite he’d been chewing, his hand tightening around his bowl, before loosening, and swallowing his food.

“I… That’s okay. Is… is everything… okay?” He asked, his voice sounding a little strained as he spoke.

“Uh? Oh, yeah. Just a glitch. No worries,” She said casually, levitating the pepper from the other end of the table, ignoring Kitty's indignant huff. She began eating again, savoring the delight of Dr. McCoy’s German goulash, before she noticed that Scott was still looking at her.

“Is something wrong?” She asked, reaching for her napkin, and wiping around her face, staring at him curiously.

“I… no. I don’t… I just... I thought you weren’t… I just… Sorry. Sorry,” He repeated, turning back to his bowl.

She didn’t miss the way he hunched over his food, free arm still wrapped protectively around his bowl, head down, his dark brown hair hanging nearly in his food his head was so low, and -not for the first time -wondered what his eyes looked like behind the red glasses he wore.

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” She said lightly. She glanced down, and spotting his Walkman in his pocket, asked, “So what are you listening to?”

He froze again, before mumbling something she couldn’t quite make out. She spent a split-second debating on whether to ask him to repeat himself, before deciding against it; it didn’t really matter at the end of the day.

“Scott? Are you finished with your food?”

Xavier’s voice cut Jean’s next question off before she could actually speak it, and she turned to see the Professor standing in the doorway, giving Scott a kindly smile.

For his part, Scott nodded quickly, giving Jean a small, unsure smile as he stood, grabbing his bowl off the table.

“Sorry, I… I gotta… gotta go do… Sorry,” He finished quietly, chewing on his bottom lip as he stared at her.

“Oh. That’s… cool. I’ll see you around later?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll uh… see you… around.”

While she couldn’t be positive, she was almost sure he sounded happier than he had before.

* * *

 

 

“Making friends, are we?” Charles asked, glancing behind him as Scott trailed along behind his chair.

“What? Oh, Jean. Uh… yeah. I… guess so?” Scott said, clearly uncomfortable with the subject. “We uh… talked. Earlier today.”

“I see. And have you tried talking with anyone else? Ororo, perhaps? Or maybe Kathrine?”

“I… I haven’t… I mean I don’t… It’s…” The boy struggled, shoulders stooping more than usual -something Charles wouldn’t have thought possible.

He motioned Scott into his study, driving his chair around to his desk as the boy sat, almost ramrod straight in the high back chair, hands clenched together in his lap.

“These students are going to be your teammates, Scott. I know making friends isn’t your forte, but you _need_ to make the effort,” Charles said gently, leaning his head down a bit to try and look him in the face -which the boy studiously avoided. “Scott, look at me, please.”

He added just enough power of suggestion to make the boy obey, seemingly of his own volition - _he needed to build his confidence, desperately_ -and smiled as Scott looked up. He hoped the boy was looking at him, but it was impossible to tell with the thick red glasses Hank had made for him.

“You’ve made _great_ improvements, Scott. Leaps and bounds past where you were when you first arrived. But you’ve still a long way to go before reaching your goals, hmm?”

“I… I don’t… I… Wh…”

Charles sighed as Scott began to shake in his chair, and sent out calming waves towards the boy.

“It’s alright, Scott. I know you’ve had an… eventful day. Why don’t we call this good for the day, and you can go get some rest? You must be exhausted. Sound good?”

The boy barely took the time to nod, before darting out of the chair, and through the door. Charles traced his psychic signal as he ran through the house, and up to his room on the third floor. If habit held, he'd curl up in the corner of his room, his music player blasting loudly, where he'd stay for the rest of the evening.

He wasn’t sure what he was going to do with him. Even after six months of improvement, Scott was still far behind where he should be; where he _needed_ to be. He grasped only the most basic social skills, and his confidence was non-existent, along with his negligible emotional maturity. While most of the students went to the local high school -at least, until Charles could get enough teachers to teach them at the mansion -he’d felt it unwise to try and put Scott in amongst his peers. So he was taught by Charles himself, and Hank on occasion.

But even that was a trying task; any indication that Charles wasn’t happy with his answer, or -God forbid -he gave a wrong answer, and the boy would literally begin shaking as if he was having a seizure most days, ending the lessons prematurely. Other times, he’d grow angry and sullen, as if he was testing to see how much it would take before Charles or Hank would react like Jack O’ Diamonds, or Nathan Essex.

While that would obviously never happen, Charles found himself growing frustrated -not at Scott, obviously, but with the entire situation. He could sense so much untapped _potential_ in the boy, so much hidden deep in the shadowy corners of his mind; if he could simply break the boy’s programming, he would be an excellent leader someday.

And it _was_ programming -not brainwashing, in the way most people would understand it, but Scott had learned from a young age that failure was punished in very painful ways; angering an adult, for Scott, usually lead to disastrous consequences -the evidence of that was written all over his young body. Charles could feel his mind racing somedays, growing more and more anxious for the other shoe to drop, no matter how many times Charles assured him there was no other shoe.

He sighed again. He knew it was illogical, and incredibly optimistic, if not outright impossible, for him to expect much improvement after only six months. After all, Scott had spent five years learning fear and pain at the hands of his so-called caregivers. It would take far longer than a few months to break those lessons, and teach him confidence, self-worth, and basic emotional health, much less start his training as a leader.

But it didn’t change his frustration. And Scott seemed almost as good as an empath at detecting moods. He simply couldn’t grasp that Charles wasn’t angry or frustrated at him. In Scott’s world, anger, frustration, rage, or even boredom, of adults were taken out on him, regardless of his behavior.

Scott, more than any one, or anything else, sometimes made him question his view of humanity as generally good.


	5. Chapter 5

Jean lay, tucked into her own bed, floating off, nestled into her large goose-down blanket, the sounds of Jubilee snoring softly mere background noise after six months.

She’d tried to find Scott after dinner; she’d made her way to the ‘dormitory wing’, when the Professor’s voice had firmly told her to leave him alone -that he needed some space. She’d briefly debated on going anyways, just to see what the Professor would do, but in the end, she’d admitted to herself that, in this instance, he probably did know Scott better than she did.

So she’d drifted around until lights out at ten thirty, hoping maybe he’d come down, and ‘join’ the others in the play room. He never actually _sat_ with them, or did anything with them, but he’d usually curl up in the oversized plushy chair with his Walkman, or whatever book he was reading, hanging on the fringe of socializing with the others.

But he hadn’t come down.

So she’d went to bed as usual, brushing her teeth in the bathroom she shared with Jubilee, Kitty, and Ororo, climbing into her PJ’s, and -after Jubilee had shut off the light -pulling her stuffed dog out from underneath her bed.

She’d been dreaming about something -for the life of her, she couldn’t remember what -when she’d felt the psychic scream rip through her mind, sending her scrambling out of her bed and against the wall, hands covering her ears in what she subconsciously knew was a pointless gesture. Hell, glancing over, she could see that Jubilee had merely shifted a bit, a slight uptick in her snoring, having caught only the bare edges of what was boring into Jean's mind.

She desperately tried to shut it out, scrambling to try and get her mental defenses in place, but it was too much; the Professor had told her it was important to always keep them up, because it was nearly impossible to bring them around after somebody had already breached your mind.

After about twenty seconds of struggling, she felt her defenses falling into place, a surge of power by the Professor aiding her efforts. She sighed in relief, before she pulled herself to her feet.

 _What was that?_ She sent out towards the Professor.

_Nothing to worry about; go back to bed, Jean._

_Alright_ , she sent back, closing him out of her mind as she moved to the door. _Like hell I will_ , she thought, as soon as she knew the Professor wasn’t listening in. Padding along the hallways as quietly as she could, she steadily made her way through the boys’ dorms, past Dr. McCoy’s lab, and towards Scott’s room.

As she drew closer to the door, a feeling of unease crept over her, making her hesitate as she reached for the doorknob, hand shaking unsteadily for some reason. Chiding herself for being a 'fraidy cat, she forced herself to turn the knob, and step inside.

The first thing that caught her eye, entering the room for the first time, was the night lights. There had to be at least a half dozen, scattered around the room, lighting up any corner, and casting a dim light up the walls.

The next thing she saw was Scott. He lay on his back, fists clenched in the sheets, jaw tight, sweat dripping over his entire face.

A nightmare.

She drew closer, stepping quietly, setting herself down on the edge of the bed gently.

She could help. The Professor had worked with her on calming people down before; it would, in theory, be easier while they were sleeping, and their mental defenses were down. She could take whatever nightmare he was having, and ease it into more pleasant thoughts with relative ease.

Concentrating, she gently pushed her psychic tendrils out towards Scott, who still lay on the bed, his muted groans having turned into soft, quiet whimpers, body unmoving.

But almost as soon as she touched his psyche, it felt like she’d run head first into a brick wall, the shock of it stunning her for a moment. Scott still hadn’t moved, but she hadn’t run into a mental block like that on anyone outside of the Professor.

Well. She didn’t need her telepathy. So after only a second of hesitation, she reached out, and lightly set her hand on his ankle.

Instantly, the foot yanked back, at the same time as Scott’s other foot came around towards her head. Only instinct protected her, sending her scrambling off the bed moments before the blow connected, landing hard on the floor with a muffled yelp.

“Scott, it’s me! It’s Jean,” She said loudly, crab walking backwards as Scott shot out of the bed.

There were a few seconds of heavy silence, both teenagers panting, before Scott sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Jean? What… what’re you _doing_ in here?” As he spoke, his hands inched out towards the nightstand, and Jean belatedly realized he was trying to find his glasses, that his eyes had stayed tightly closed since he'd awoke. Which was good, since she'd seen him tear through trees the size of cars with his eyes open.

She pulled herself up, reaching for the glasses that had apparently fallen to the floor during the confusion.

“Here,” She said gently, laying them on his lap. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to…” Her voice trailed off into stunned silence, as she finally noticed the horrifying tableau that was Scott’s bare chest.

Long, ropey-looking scars covered nearly every inch of his stomach and chest; the ones on his arm, and under his neck, were white, almost surgical looking. Smaller round ones dotted is lower arms, scattered about, and she could almost make out a pattern in their placement.

_Hundreds of scars. All different shapes and sizes._

Scott noticed her staring, and woodenly reached for the shirt on the edge of the bed, as Jean looked away in embarrassment.

“You… you were having a nightmare,” She mumbled lamely, shifting from foot to foot, trying her damnedest to look anywhere but at him.

“I… I um… M’sorry. I didn’t… The Professor thought… down here, nobody would…” He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

She forced a small smile, despite the sick feeling rolling through her stomach. Apparently, this wasn’t a one-off occurrence, if the professor had moved Scott out of the dorm halls to keep him from waking the other students.

“It’s fine, Scott. No big deal,” She said gently, sitting down next to him on the bed.

An awkward silence filled the room, broken only by the sound of Scott chewing on the side of his thumb for a few minutes, before he finally cleared his throat.

“I uh… I mean, you should probably… You’re probably tired, and… If you wanna… go back to bed or… whatever.”

Jean could almost feel her heart break at the lost, lonely look on his face. He had yet to actually look at her, his hair falling over his eyes, head down, and tilted to one side, hands clenched together tightly in his lap.

How many nights had he suffered alone? How many nights had he spent trapped in the memories of whatever had caused those scars? Nights that the other kids spent tucked into their warm beds, fast asleep, while he tossed and turned, locked away in whatever horrors his mind conjured up for him to relive?

Did he try to go back to sleep after the nightmare ended? Or did he stay up until dawn, too scared to try and go back to bed?

Whatever he did, it wasn’t happening again; not on Jean’s watch.

“We could go down to the kitchen, if you want. I think there’s still a gallon of strawberry ice cream in the freezer,” She said casually, standing, and offering him her hand. "I'm wide awake now anyways. And maybe this way, we can actually get some ice cream before Drake and Warren eat it all."

She had to fight back tears at the look of gratitude in his eyes.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so I really wasn't happy with this chapter as it stood before, so I took it down, rewrote, edited, etc., until I came up with this. Hope yall enjoy. Another chapter from Scott's perspective will be coming up next. Sorry for the delay.

Forty-five minutes later, the two teenagers sat at the island in the kitchen, the ice cream container sitting half-empty between them, the house eerily quiet except for Jean’s quiet voice, and the occasional clinking of metal spoon against metal spoon.

While Jean knew she’d lived a sheltered life in white-bread, middle-class America, Jean knew enough to avoid asking Scott about his past, or what had happened; she could put together a fairly gruesome picture without dragging Scott back into the nightmares she’d woken him up to avoid. So she’d rambled on, about school, her friends back home, butmostly about her pets, from the various dogs and cats she’d had over the years, down to her third grade salamander, Colonel Mustard, and her chinchilla Chi Chi.

While Scott hadn’t contributed much to the conversation, he’d seemed to be enjoying himself, smiling occasionally as Jean spoke, nodding at the right places, his shoulders slowing relaxing as Jean went on.

“I mean… that’s kind of weird, right? I’m fifteen, I’m almost a freaking _adult_ , and I still can’t fall asleep unless I have Mugs. I mean… the poor thing is ten years old, missing an eye, and one of my actual dogs chewed off most of his tail when I was eight, but I still just… I don’t know how many times my mom has sewed him back together, how many times I’ve had to hand-wash him in the sink, blow-drying him… But I’ve had him since I was six, and I just… It’s stupid, I know. Embarrassing, really,” She said with a self-deprecating laugh.

“It’s… it’s not stupid,” Scott said, stirring at a section of the ice cream, leaning on his elbows on the table. “It’s… It’s nice. I had… I had a stuffed bear… when… before my parents… I lost… In the crash…” There were a few moments of silence, his mouth moving, but no words coming out. Then his jaw snapped shut, he glared at the ice cream for a moment, before continuing, “I had a stuffed bear. When I was a kid. I lost him. But I’d still… I’d still have him, if I could. I don’t… Nothing embarrassing about it.”

Jean bit her lip for a moment, bowing her head, before looking up. “I’m sorry. About your folks, I mean. I can’t imagine how hard that must have been. How old were you?”

Scott stared at the granite countertop for a moment, the steady tapping of his foot on the rung of the stool the only noise in the room, before he finally spoke.

“I was… nine. I think? Maybe… maybe ten? I… I hit my head… and then…”

Jean watched, equal parts curious and concerned, as Scott’s face twitched for about ten seconds, his eyes blinking rapidly, before his face relaxed, and his eyes slid back into focus.

“It was a uh… a plane crash,” He continued, as if he hadn’t paused at all, moving on as if nothing had happened. “In Nebraska. No! No… No, it was Alaska… It happened in… In Alaska? Not… Not Nebraska. Nebraska…”

He paused, taking a deep breath, before looking up at Jean, a pained look in his eyes.

“I… I have these… _gaps_. In my memories, I… There are… holes. Things I can’t… I can’t _remember_ ,” He said, sounding frustrated. “I can’t… I can’t focus on… it’s like… they’re all… they just get… jumbled. Confused. And… and when I try to… to _unjumble_ … them, it’s like… I just… I can’t, it… It just… it’s… complicated,” He finished morosely.

Jean couldn’t help herself; she reached across the table, and grabbed his hand, squeezing it tightly. At first, Scott froze, a panicked, deer-in-the-headlights look in his eye, before he relaxed, and squeezed her hand back.

“We’ll figure it out, Scott. Have you… does the Professor know?”

He nodded miserably, pulling his hand back, and folding them across his chest, his foot tapping a mile a minute against the stool. “Yeah. He… he knows. He was trying to… to help me figure it out, to… to try and fill the blanks but… A couple weeks ago, we were… he tried to…” He chewed on his bottom lip for a second, before shaking his head. “My nightmares were… getting better, and then… after that session, he tried to… and now I haven’t… I haven’t slept through the night in… in _weeks_. And that makes it… it makes it harder to focus… and I lose… more time, which makes the… the nightmares worse. I’m… I’m exhausted,” He admitted quietly.

“Maybe… Maybe I could help?” Jean offered. “I don’t know what I can do that the Professor can’t, but… maybe somebody different could do more? I mean, it’s worth a shot, right? If it helps you get some sleep?”

Scott scoffed, a grim smile on his face. “I don’t think… If the Professor… I don’t think it’s safe for you to… go wandering around some place the the Professor is scared to go.”

Jean forced a smile to her face, hoping she looked more confident than she felt.

“I want to help, Scott. I’m not afraid.”

He shook his head slowly, staring at the table. “Jean, I… Some of the… some of the gaps… There are things I _can_ remember that are… are pretty… they’re… _bad_. I don’t… The things I can’t remember… I don’t… You… I mean… I’m not a uh… I don’t want you to think...”

He stopped, his whole body trembling, his mouth opening and closing, trying to say more. After a few heart-rending moments, Jean finally reached out, and grabbed his hand again.

“Scott? Hey. Just relax, okay? It’s fine. If you don’t want me to use telepathy on you, I won’t. But there’s _nothing_ I could find in your head that would change what I think about you, alright?” She said gently, grasping his hand tightly.

“You don’t… you don’t _understand_ , I’m not… The stuff that… I’m not…”

“Hey,” Jean interrupted, giving him a soft smile, cutting him off as he started to sputter. “You’re a good guy, Scott. If you don’t want me to help, I won’t. But if it’s because you’re scared of what I’ll think… _Nothing_ is gonna change, okay? You’re a _good_ person. Whatever happened to you… it doesn’t matter, alright? It wasn’t your fault.”

“You don’t… you don’t _know_ that,” Scott said, his voice getting stronger as he spoke. “You don’t _know_ what I’ve done… what I _did_. You don’t know what I _am_.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alright, so firstly: Be warned, I could no longer reign in my Xavier-hatred. Like, I seriously hate this dude. I tried to make it as fair to him as possible, don't know if I succeeded, but honestly, I won't be heartbroken if I didn't lol.
> 
> Also... there's a big fat 'F' bomb in here. Only one, and a justifiable one, but I figured I'd throw out the warning.

Jean sighed, dropping her spoon in the ice cream bowl, wiping her hands on her pants as she took a few moments to figure out how she was going to say it, before she sighed again.

“Scott… I know it’s… it’s probably none of my business but… What could you have _possibly_ done to make yourself think you’re a bad guy?”

He hesitated for a few minutes, his mouth open, like he wanted to speak, eyes squinting closed, a pained look on his face. Finally, he groaned.

“I don’t know! I can’t remember!” He blurted out angrily. “I can’t _fucking_ _remember_!”

“Jean. Scott.”

The Professor’s voice -his actual voice -made both of the teenagers jump. Jean watched, sadly, as Scott scrambled to try and hide the ice cream container, before finally giving up.

“It wasn’t… It wasn’t her fault, Professor, I… It was… I did it, I just wanted to… I’m sorry, it was my fault. Jean was just… she was just being nice. I’m sorry.”

Jean was instantly on her feet. “What?! No, it wasn’t! Professor, I –“

_Jean. Stop. Now._

The soft smile the Professor gave Scott belied the firm, almost harsh, voice in her head.

“Scott, _no one_ is in trouble. Not for the ice cream, not for being awake, nor for being out of bed. You _know_ that. But you _do_ have a big day ahead of you tomorrow, and I believe that Dr. McCoy expected to get an early start to the wrecking yard. Why don’t you go see if you can get a few hours sleep, hmm?” At the suspicious look in Scott’s eye, he added, “I promise you, Scott, Jean isn’t going to be punished. We’re just going to have a little chat, and then she’ll quickly follow you up to bed, alright?”

Without being prodded, Jean forced a smile to her own face. “Yeah, Scott, it’s no biggie; it’s all good. I’ll see you tomorrow after you get back, yeah?”

Still hesitant, Scott moved towards the door to the kitchen, giving the Professor a wide berth, stopping only long enough to give Jean an apologetic glance, before he darted out. After a few seconds, the Professor turned his head away from the door, and back towards her.

“Please, Jean: sit.”

Instinctively, Jean started to sit, before stopping herself. “I don’t _want_ to sit,” She said, trying, and failing to keep the angry tone from her voice. “You put a mental block on him. And he doesn’t even _know_. He can’t remember where his parents _died_ , and you turned him into a stuttering _mess_ ,” She said, not bothering to keep the accusation from her voice. "He tried to remember, and it was like his brain started skipping like a record!"

“Jean, you _know_ better than that. I wouldn’t do that,” He said calmly, steepling his fingers together. “I understand you’re upset, and disturbed -which you wouldn’t be, if you’d _listened_ when I told you to not go prying -but let’s be rational, hmm?

“Now… Yes, I did put a mental block on him. But that’s not what ‘ _turned him into a stuttering mess_ ’, as you so eloquently put it. Whether or not you believe it, Scott has come an _incredibly_ long way since he came to the mansion. The block aided him in his efforts. While Scott’s past is his to divulge if he chooses, I will tell you this: he spent _four years_ under the control of a particularly sadistic telepath… One far more powerful than you, and only slightly less powerful than I.

“You’ve felt psychic wounds before. You felt it tonight; you know how damaging that is. I simply couldn’t let the boy walk around with injuries like that, practically sending out a signal for anyone with ill-intentions to further use him. The block simply keeps those wounds at bay. And I fear without them, Scott would be far more of a ‘mess’ than you can imagine.

“I _told_ you **not** to pry, Jean. Scott’s mind was literally a playground for a man who redesigned his inner psyche to his whims; there are booby traps, pit falls, and memory snares everywhere. It’s a place where even I tread cautiously, and only when necessary. If that block hadn’t been there, I fear what would have happened tonight, when you tried to breech his mind. I don’t like the idea of having to phone your parents to tell them that their daughter is a drooling vegetable.”

Jean bristled, at his casual dismissal of her own telepathic abilities, and his attitude towards her, treating her like she was some sort of stumbling, bumbling baby.

“I can handle myself,” She snapped, putting both hands on the island. “I’m not helpless, and whatever you’re doing to help him isn’t _working_!”

The condescending smile he gave her set her hackles on edge. “Jean… Let’s be reasonable here. While you may not be helpless, you’re still in the infancy stages of your powers. And do you really think that what happened to Scott will ‘go away’ over night? That six years of trauma would simply vanish with a few sessions? Or do you think that you, a fifteen year old child, will be able to telepathically heal what someone who has been doing this for nearly double your life span cannot?”

Almost instantly, Jean deflated. The Professor was right -as much as she hated to admit it. She had no idea what she was doing, and even her poke at the wall earlier had nearly knocked her on her ass. And expecting Scott to miraculously get better simply because of her was incredibly unrealistic.

“So what?” She asked, her voice apologetic. “We just… sit and wait? That’s it? There _has_ to be _something_ I can do.”

“There is, Jean. You can be his friend. More than anything else, _that’s_ what Scott needs right now. He hasn’t had a real friend since the death of his parents. You can simply be there for him when he needs it. It may not be as… _glamorous_ as telepathically ‘fixing’ him. It may not be as easy as it would be to simply ‘rewire’ certain things. But it’s the _best_ thing for Scott, and it’s something that you can do. Something you’ve already started to do, simply by being yourself.

“I understand you want to help, Jean, I truly do. And I commend you for it. I know you’ve a big heart, and you’re simply trying to do what you think is right. But please… _please_ , trust me when I tell you that simply listening to him, and being there for him is the best thing you could do for him.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alright, shorter chapter guys, but the next few are going to get... a little intense, shall we say. We're going to be delving far more into Scott's past, how the discovery of those events shaped who he is, as well as how their discovery effects him, Jean, and their fledgling friendship. So this is sort of the intro chapter to the more dark stuff.

Things had been going… pretty good, actually. Jean had listened to the Professor, and for almost six weeks, she and Scott had become practically inseparable. The Professor had told her to make Scott feel safe, and welcome, and that’s what she did. At dinner, when he’d sit away from the group, she’d slide into the seat next to him. While watching movies (something she’d convinced him to try on Wednesday Weekly Movie Night), she’d sit in the back of the room with him, away from the others. Sometimes they’d sit in ‘their’ tree out back, and -after two weeks -he’d finally invited her out into the garage with him.

 She’d often wondered where he disappeared to for hours at a time, but she’d never wanted to pry. As it turned out, he was working on an old motorcycle he’d found somewhere (he’d refused to tell her where, and she hadn’t pushed). Apparently, once a week, Dr. McCoy would take him out to find used parts from the local pick-and-pulls around the area, and Scott was slowly reassembling the ’79 Harley.

* * *

 

“Hey, Scott!” Jean said, plopping down on her usual crate, slinging her bookbag across the floor towards the workbench. “How’s it going?”

“Not too bad,” Came the somewhat muffled response, his head partially underneath the bike. “How was school?”

“Alright,” She said with a shrug, pulling off her jacket, and leaning back. “I think I bombed my French test though.”

“What, you get an eighty?”

She chuckled a bit, getting comfortable. She was still amazed at how much more relaxed, and at ease he was while working on his bike. Like having something else to focus on made it easier for him to focus his brain on talking. Or… not focus, maybe.

Either way, talking to him while he was working on his bike, there was no stuttering, no hesitation… He even joked on occasion.

“Seventy-nine,” She said with a small smile. “Which is, like… really pathetic seeing as how my grandmother _was_ French.”

“My grandparents were Scottish,” Scott said, almost absently as he stood, wiping his hands on a rag. “I…” He paused, staring at Jean for a moment. “Huh. My grandparents were Scottish.”

She couldn’t help her grin. “That’s great, Scott. You’re starting to remember more and more.”

He scoffed, scuffing his foot back and forth against the ground. “Yeah but it’s all… it’s _little_ stuff,” He muttered. “I still can’t remember most of the big stuff.”

Jean sighed. “Scott… From what I could tell, and what the Professor said… Somebody messed with your mind pretty bad. Like, _telepathically_ messed with. Meaning, short of telepathically fixing those connections -which isn’t easy at the best of times -you might not be able to recover them. I’m sorry,” She finished sadly. Seeing the frustrated look on his face, she hastened to add, “And the little stuff is important too. Things like your favorite color, or that your mom liked strawberry ice cream means a lot too. And life is made up of little things like that.”

He scrubbed one hand through his hair as he sat down at the workbench, glaring down at something that looked round with spokes on it, covered in grease and dirt. He began slowly cleaning it off, taking a rag to each spoke as he talked. “Yeah but… without the big things, the little things don’t really _mean_ anything. Yeah, okay, so I remember my mom’s favorite ice cream flavor, but I can’t remember if she was the type of lady to just say that, because she knew I liked it too, or if she actually liked it. Knowing my favorite color is blue doesn’t mean anything when I can’t remember what blue even _looked_ like without these damn glasses.”

“What’s the Professor say about it?”

His face became frustrated, his hands tightening around the spokes until Jean began to worry about him hurting himself. “That I ‘ _can’t push these things_ ’,” He said, in a fairly good imitation of the Professor’s accent. “That my ‘ _brain will heal itself, if given time and safety to do so_ ’. Honestly… I think he’s just… I think he’s… just scared… of… of going into my head again,” He admitted quietly.

Jean knew the fact that he was faltering over words meant he was getting too agitated. But she couldn’t bring herself to just change the subject, either. Mostly because she knew, he was right to be frustrated with it, and wanting to push.

Which lead her to offer, “Well… I told you I can try and go in; see if I can try and repair the damage.”

He sighed, setting the piece of metal down with exaggerated care in his frustration. “Honestly… I know it might… it might make me a bad person… _Selfish_. Letting you… you go in somewhere so… so dangerous… But I just… I have to _know_. And I want… I want to be… normal. I’m tired of… Of people thinking I’m… That I’m retarded because… because I can’t string together a full freaking sentence. Or that I… I have panic attacks… and I don’t know why… whatever it is makes me… makes me panic… I just know it _does_. I just… I just want to be _normal_.”

Jean nodded, chewing on the side of her lip for a moment. “Alright. Then how about tonight? After everybody else has gone to bed? I can meet you in your room around midnight?”

Jean knew it was stupid to offer. Knew it was stupidly optimistic to think she could get through the Professor’s wall, much less fix whatever the unknown telepath had done to him.

But she couldn’t deny him the opportunity to try.


	9. Chapter 9

The two teenagers sat cross-legged on Scott’s bed, Jean in her pajamas, Scott still fully dressed.

“Are you sure about this? We don't know what exactly we might trigger here.”

Jean tried to keep the hesitancy out of her voice, struggling to keep a straight face, to not let her nervousness show.

She _really_ hoped she was doing a better job than Scott was; sweat beaded on his forehead, and there were a few spots of blood on his lip from where he was chewing on it, almost manically, as he nodded, staring down at his lap.

“Uh… yeah. Yeah, I’m… I’m ready. Are uh… are you… ready?” He asked, swallowing a few times. For once, she was pretty sure that his stuttering had nothing to do with his brain, and everything to do with nervousness.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course. Alright, so… Let’s uh… let’s get started. So I need you to just… to try and relax,” Jean instructed, moving her hands to either side of his head. “And I need you to… to just breathe, steady, and try to think of happy things.”

Scott nodded, taking a deep breath. Jean closed her eyes and psychically reached out…

* * *

 

She hit the mental wall so hard, the jolt nearly forced her right back out. But she held on, gritting her teeth through the pain as she opened her eyes.

The miles-high red wall stretched as far as the eye could see in either direction, blocking sight of anything other than the dusky grey sky above. Setting her hand on the wall, she was caught up in a brief moment of power, nearly overwhelming her. Focusing all of her power on the wall, she put her hands against it, and shoved as hard as she could. There was a red flash, then a moment of nothingness, before she found herself standing on the opposite side of the wall.

It was just as dark and dreary as the side she’d just left, the sickly brown sun, dried grass, and leafless trees adding to the creepy feeling. The Graystone building in the middle of the ‘yard’ was covered in creeping ivy, not unlike the school, but more… institutional, if she had to put a word on it. The whole scene reminded her of the house on the end of her street that everyone swore was haunted.

She shivered, feeling a cold breeze blowing, and she felt a sinking feeling.

“Scott? Scott, are you here?” She called out, trying to project her ‘voice’ throughout the yard, hoping he was somewhere near by. She wasn’t exactly eager to trapeze into the house by herself without a guide.

It took about a minute or so, but eventually, Scott appeared beside her, materializing out of nowhere. Immediately though, she recognized that, while it was obviously Scott, it wasn’t exactly ‘her’ Scott. This Scott stood straight, not curled on himself, and while his hair was still on the shaggy side, it wasn’t nearly as long, and didn’t cover his eyes. A part of her remembered back to the Professor’s explanation that this was a subconscious projection of himself -almost a true self as it were.

Then she noticed his eyes. A beautiful, dark brown, the usual glasses absent as he peered around, his hands shoved in his pockets, before his eyes locked on Jean.

“Hey. So home sweet home, huh?” He said, his voice a studied blankness as he stared at her, without actually meeting her eyes.

“Uh… Not… exactly the wording I would’ve used. Is this… where you grew up?” Jean asked, trying to keep any judgement from her tone. From Scott’s chuckle, she knew she’d failed, but he didn’t seem actually upset, more… sardonically amused.

“You could say that, I suppose. After the plane accident with my folks in Alaska, I ended up here. After my hospital stint, of course. Welcome to The State Home For Foundlings of Omaha, Nebraska.”

Jean shivered, wrapping her arms around herself. “This is a, uh… Did it actually _look_ like this?” At Scott’s nod, she asked, “How long were you here?”

Scott shrugged, running one hand through his hair. “Not sure. Time didn’t… It really didn’t have much meaning here. The days all just sort of… blended together. The Professor figures about four years. Maybe a little less. You probably shouldn’t be here.”

The last part sent a jolt through Jean, her head snapping around and locking onto Scott again.

“I… what?” She stuttered, feeling a flash of fear run through her. “Scott, you agreed to this. Right?”

He shrugged, an almost guilty look on his face, and there was the Scott that Jean recognized.

“Yeah. Doesn’t mean it’s a good idea,” He muttered. “Even I don’t go inside. It’s definitely not a happy place. Not one that I ever wanted to go back to either.”

“Well, if we’re going to figure anything out, we _both_ have to go inside,” Jean said practically, trying to keep her voice level. “Not going to figure anything out standing out here, and I can't maneuver it by myself. I wonder... why here, though?” Jean mused, slowly moving towards the house.

“Why here, what?” Scott asked curiously, trailing behind her a few paces.

“Well… usually places like this - our inner psyches -are places where we felt safe, or happy, or even just places we enjoyed. Childhood homes, play parks, libraries, theaters… The whole concept behind an inner psyche is supposed to be like… like a retreat. A safe place to hide. Obviously telepaths have more control over what our psyche’s look like, but even non-telepaths, and non-mutants have subconscious control over what their psyches look like… Well, I’m going to go out on a limb and say you probably didn't have many happy or enjoyable memories here.”

Scott paused on the edge of the porch, leaning against the railing. “That’s probably a safe assumption.”

“So why _here_?” Jean pondered. “Why would your inner place be _here_ of all the places you've been? Why not your home with your parents? Or why didn't it change to the school after a few months?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t make it. Hell, I was never here before the Professor brought me during one of our therapy sessions."


	10. Chapter 10

Jean reached for the door, a frown coming to her face as her hand went through the knob, passing through it as if it were made of air. She tried again, but the knob continued to ignore her, causing her to grit her teeth in frustration. They hadn’t even gotten into the house yet, and she was failing already.

“Yeah, same thing happened to the Professor. He had to shove his way through. Took a lot of power,” Scott said, his voice casual, but she could hear the undercurrent of tension there, and she wondered if that had been the event a few weeks ago that he’d spoken of. The one that brought his nightmares back.

Which was something she wanted to avoid. So, forcing herself to relax, she took a deep breath, and motioned for Scott to come up next to her. When he did, she took his hand, giving it a light squeeze as she tilted her head until she caught his gaze.

“Alright, here’s how we’re gonna do this: this is your damn mind. Yours. Nobody else’s. So there is no door. You don’t want a door here, and there is no door here, okay? That’s all. Just focus on that. There is. No. Door.”

Scott looked at her like she was nuts, but he placed a hand on the door anyways, the other tightening against Jean’s. As he closed his eyes, leaning in closer to the door, Jean sent a surge of her power into him.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, with a shuddering creak, the door collapsed in on itself, disappearing into a pile of dust on the ground.

Scott stared at his hand in disbelief for a moment, before looking over at Jean quizzically, causing her to chuckle.

“I just gave you the juice, Scott. You did the rest yourself,” She said proudly, stepping over the pile of dust and into the house. “You actually did pretty well; that was really impressive control.”

Stepping into the house, her first instinct was that it looked like a waiting room or something; there was even a small table in the center of the room with a bowl of plastic fruit, just sitting there.

“I gotta say… This wasn’t exactly what I was expecting,” Jean said, glancing around. “This almost looks like a waiting room for a doctor’s office or something.”

She took a step forward, the heel of her sneaker squeaking against the linoleum, and suddenly… everything went very, very wrong.

And in that moment, Jean knew she was in way over her head.

 

It smelled like peroxide. As odd as the thought was, it was the first thing she was consciously aware of as she slowly forced her eyes open, bells still ringing in her ears, making it hard to focus.

Even after she opened her eyes, it took her time to fully grasp what she was actually seeing. It looked like something out of a mad scientist movie; an operating table with straps stood in the middle of the floor, a small rolling table of surgical tools next to it. Bright lights illuminated the table at every angle, giving her a crystal clear view of Scott, strapped to the table, a leather strap over his mouth, his eyes wide in panic. She went to move towards him, only to realize she was strapped to the wall, unable to move either.

 “Oh, look! Our audience is awake. _Excellent_. We can get started then.”

It took Jean a moment to pull her gaze away from Scott, locating the source of the voice standing in a black shadowy doorway.

He looked… _strange_. His face was silver, with long, smooth black hair, his clothing straight out of Oliver Twist or something, from his black jacket, to his red scarf. It would almost look ridiculous, except for the dark gleam in his eye as he stepped towards Jean.

“I’m actually _very_ excited to see you, Jean. Amazed, really. I can’t believe that this is actually happening. I mean, I _knew_ you two would meet one day, but to think that I would help be the catalyst for it… _Mmhmmm_. It’s amazing. Do you know who I am, my dear? Ah, no, I can see you don’t. Why would you? We’re still about… Hmm… Ten years?” He paused for a moment, looking over at Scott, his gaze appraising. “Maybe fifteen. Fifteen years away from our first actual meeting. Wonderful, though.”

His words were gibberish -even with her general confusion, she knew he wasn’t making any sense. So she quickly turned her attention back towards Scott.

“Scott? Scott! Scott, just look at me, alright? Scott! This isn’t real, okay? None of this is real. You are in control here, okay? You can stop it. You can stop all of this. You just have to focus, okay? Scott! Listen to me!”

She could feel the fear rolling off of him; knew that her words were pointless. There was no way he was going to be able to get enough control to fight off this type of mind-trap, not in the panicked state he was in. And she couldn’t pull her thoughts together enough to use her telepathy to calm him down, not with the ringing in her head.

“Oh, no, Jean. You misunderstand the situation, my dear. Didn’t your darling Professor explain the basics of telepathy to you?” He tsk’ed a few times, moving across the room. “You can’t… _interact_ … with a memory, Phoenix. If this was a… what did you call it... a mind trap? I wouldn’t be able to… respond to you. To speak to you. You wouldn’t even truly _be_ you; you’d be trapped as Scott, living out the memory next to him.

“While Scott does have many… similarly pleasant… memories of his and my time together, and I do so love reminding him of those times, this –“ He paused, indicating around the room grandly with his hands “ -is something completely different. You see… After my first year with Scott, I realized that it was only a matter of time before he left me. He was too… independent. Strong-willed. _Stubborn_ ,” He said, with a paternal smile. “And, knowing that he would eventually leave, I decided to take certain… precautions. Such as putting a piece of my psyche into his. Watching. Recording. Waiting.

“I had the benefit of knowing that we would meet again. The first time. So it made it an easy decision to put a piece of myself… right… in… here…” He said slowly, tapping Scott on the center of his forehead.

Jean bit her lip as Scott whimpered, his entire body shaking, tears leaking out through his closed eyes.

“Scott, listen to me. Whatever this is, it doesn’t matter, okay? He can’t hurt you here. Whatever he is, this is still your mind. None of this is real.”

“Eh… Perhaps not… but it’s close enough to the real thing, isn’t it, Scott? Just like old times. And it’s been so long since Xavier locked me away from you. And even after he let you through his little wall, you still just refused to step inside. And I’ve been growing… lonely. Impatient. And then to find both of you here, in my playground. All together. Together at last.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alright, firstly, I apologize for the lack of an update -I've been crazy busy at work the past few weeks. Which meant that I had to write most of this on my ten minute breaks twice a night. Because of that, it's a bit... rougher... than usual, a bit more choppy. But I wanted to get it up, so you guys had something to go with.

“I can see you’re still confused. Poor girl; for someone with as much potential as you’ll have, to be trained by that _doddering_ old fool must be _incredibly_ frustrating,” The man said, his voice sympathetic as he moved away from Scott, walking towards a table at the far side of the room. Jean could just barely see him from the corner of her eye, trapped as she was.

“But perhaps _I_ can be of more instruction. You see, my dear, as a telepath, you have far more control over your conscious, and subconscious mind, and what you can do with it. Just like I do. And when you learn to harness your abilities more, you’ll be able to do this as well. To take a piece of your consciousness, and put it into another person’s mind, like a video recorder if you will. It’s a relatively complex procedure, and it _does_ diminish the telepath’s power to a degree, but it is quite possible.

“Now, of course, it isn’t quite as easy as it sounds. Even for a normal human stranger, someone of your current power level would be incapable; even you fifteen years from now might struggle. But to people whose minds are open to you… or minds that you’ve broken down, completely, until they have absolutely no defenses left… well, it is far less difficult.”

Jean couldn’t repress her shudder at the change in his voice, going from sympathetic, to ominous in a moment, as he moved back into her line of sight, moving towards Scott with something in hir hand that she couldn’t see.

But whatever it was, Scott could apparently see it all too well, and the effect was instantaneous -his whole body shook, like someone having a seizure, tears pouring down his face, eyes squeezed shut, and broken, fearful whimpering escaped from the strap covering his mouth.

“Scott, listen to me. Scott, don’t look at him, okay? Scott! _Scott_ , just look at me! This isn’t _real_! It feels real, but it’s not! You can control it! Scott! Scott!”

 “Don’t bother, my dear. You see, Scott knows _exactly_ what’s coming, and exactly how ‘ _real’_ it feels; he spent quite a few years in the physical representation of this room. I do have to admit to some… _disappointment_ that my methods never proved enough to send him back to me, but… well, it all worked out in the end, I suppose. Here we are. Together again. And now I can discover what makes the two of you tick.”

He clapped his hands together loudly, startling both the teens, Scott who flinched, and Jean who yelped.

“Now, I’ve thought quite a bit about how I would welcome Scott back to my playground, but I will admit… You being here has caught me a bit off guard, Jean.”

He turned his back towards Jean for a moment, before turning around again, his face thoughtful.

“You know… I have wondered something though. And you’re probably too young to yet know the answer. But there’s no harm in me asking, I suppose. You and Scott frequently dabbled - _will_ dabble -in time traveling. But did the fact that I… traced Scott -traced his parents -and practically raised him change that future? Will we still meet again in the past? Or has that already changed? I know that he’ll recognize me; he tried to hide it, but he knew who I was when we met, despite the difference in appearance from his childhood. But what is _too_ much? How hard can I try to send him back to me, before I change who he fundamentally is? Before I change the future where he affects my past?” The man asked, his voice brooding.

“What are you talking about?!” Jean cried, struggling against her restraints. “You’re freakin’ insane!”

“Perhaps. Perhaps not. Do you like games, Jean?”

The sudden change, in both tone, and subject, caught Jean off guard. “What?!”

“I asked if you like games. Because I have a proposition for you, Jean. A game. With Scott as the prize. Are you intrigued? The Jean _I_ knew could never refuse a challenge. Oh, _there_ it is. I can see it in your eyes. You’re angry now, aren’t you? Excellent! Let the game begin then!

“First, the objective: you will travel from this room, located in the sublevels of the basement, to the attic, where Scott and I will be patiently awaiting your arrival. You cannot use your telekinesis -you have to walk, and find the correct path. You may not use your telepathy to attempt to track us. You can use it for any other purpose… If you have the strength and will to do so.

“If you win, I’ll leave, and never return. But if _I_ win… You and Scott will both stay here. Forever.

“Now, I’ve lifted the barrier keeping you here; you’re free to leave, to return to your own body, at any time you wish. Any questions?”

“What happens if I leave?” Jean growled, struggling to keep her temper under control. “What about Scott?”

“He’ll stay here. Under my _tender_ and _loving_ care, until such a time as you return, and make your way to the attic.

“Now, I know what you’re thinking, dear child. Yes, you could leave, and go get your beloved professor; perhaps the combined strength of you both would allow you to force your way back inside. _Maybe_ you’d even bend the house to your will. But I want you to think about the _time_ that would take, Jean. How long, and difficult of a task that would be, with no guarantee of success. Then I want you to think about what I could do to poor Scott in that time.

“So what do you say, Ms. Grey? Would you like to play?”

“Only under two conditions,” Jean said firmly.

The man laughed. “Oh, you are just as I remember. Here you sit, in the jaws of the beast, yet you still presume to bargain. Alright, my dear, tell me these… conditions of yours. I’m feeling generous today; I _might_ even agree to them.”

Jean ignored his mocking tone -and the nagging voice in the back of her head, saying she had no way of forcing him to keep his word. “Number one: you don’t rearrange the house while I’m in it. I know you’ll have traps, and locks, and puzzles, and God knows what else, but you won’t physically _move_ the rooms, change their location, my location, or Scott’s location.”

The man shrugged casually. “Fair enough, I suppose. What’s the second condition?”

“You don’t lay a finger on Scott. I know you won’t free him, but you won’t touch him unless I lose.”

“Hmm…. That’s not acceptable. But how about we split the difference? I’ll give you… Twelve hours. Twelve hours where he will not be physically harmed. After that, I’m free to do as I please until you arrive.”

“And you won’t change how quickly time passes, or use any time-altering mind-traps,” Jean countered.

He thought for a moment, tilting his head, before nodding. “It’s agreed.”

“Alright.” She took a deep breath. “I’ll play.”

“Wonderful! Do be careful, my dear. You never know what you’ll find in an old house like this. See you at the top!”

With that, Scott and the man disappeared, along with the bonds holding Jean to the wall.

She took a moment to compose herself, taking a few slow, steady breaths like the Professor had taught her, before moving towards the door.

_I’m coming, Scott. Just hold on._


	12. Chapter 12

As Jean started up the staircase at the end of the hall, she carefully sent out a psychic tendril in front of her, probing each step as she went, finding nothing until she got to the door at the top.

She could feel the heavy telepathic weaving on the door, and instantly knew that it would take hours -at least -to disable whatever it was set to trigger -hours she didn’t have if she wanted to find and rescue Scott before the man began torturing him. So, gritting her teeth, she reached for the handle, and pushed it open.

 

* * *

 

_She knew they were going too fast. And the angle was all wrong; Dad always said to keep it level on the horizon, but glancing out the window, he could tell the nose of the plane was more down than up._

_Something smelled awful. Like when Mom accidentally caught the stove on fire making Thanksgiving dinner last year._

_“Scott, hurry! Come on, Alex, you too! Move!”_

_She fought to keep from panicking at Mom’s voice; she sounded scared-mad, like when she’d caught her and Alex trying to jump out of their second story window with blankets as parachutes._

_“Mom, what’s happening?!” She demanded, struggling to pull away as Mom roughly yanked the parachute straps up on her shoulders. “What’re you doing?!”_

_Mom hugged her tightly, so tight that it hurt, before pulling away again, grabbing her by the arms._

_“Listen to me, Scott: You have to hold on to Alex, okay? The other parachutes burnt, so you have to hold on to Alex. Watch out for him, and take care of him! Promise me, Scott: no matter what happens, you’ll look out for your brother!”_

_She nodded as seriously as she could, trying to sniffle back her tears._

_“I promise, Mom. I’ll take care of him.”_

_Mom handed Alex to her, and she wrapped her arms around him tight, squeezing Bear between them._

_“Katherine, we’re out of time! They’ve gotta go **now**!” Dad called from the cockpit, his voice tight. “Get ‘em outta here!”_

_Mom nodded, pushing her and Alex towards the door. “Remember, Scott, eight count, then pull. I love you.”_

_Then she could hear only the roaring of the air, as the ground below them spun in circles, Alex’s screaming a dull echo in the wind. Her arms hurt, but she held on as hard as she could, Alex clinging to her like the monkey dad always called him._

_Eight count._

_She yanked the cord as hard as she could. The chute opened, and she couldn’t help the scream as she heard a loud ‘pop’, her right shoulder exploding in a wave of pain. But she ignored it, gritting her teeth, and tightening her grip._

_“I got you, Alex! It’s gonna be okay!”_

_“Scott! Fire!”_

_She looked up, and seen that Alex was right: a small hole was gradually getting bigger, burning from the corner in. Their descent, which had slowed, was starting to speed up again._

_“Hold on, Alex!” She yelled, trying to wrap herself around his smaller body. “Whatever happens, don’t let go!”_

_There was a blinding light, agonizing pain…and then everything went black._

 

* * *

 

Jean stumbled out of the little room, her head and shoulder aching in phantom pain, dizziness making her steps unsure.

Being trapped in someone else’s memories was never pleasant, even if the memory was. It was disorienting, being someone different, than snapping back to reality, leaving a disjointed, wrong feeling that took hours to fade.

But even through the nausea, she knew that that had to have been the plane crash that had killed both his parents. He’d never mentioned his brother -Alex -which was strange.

As she stepped back into the lobby-like front room, she had a horrifying thought. Had Alex survived the landing? They’d still been a good forty or fifty feet in the air when the parachute failed completely; could a kid that small, that young, survive a fall like that? But why would Scott talk about his parents, but make no mention of his brother?

You best hurry, Jean; you’re running out of time. Tick tock, my dear.

She ignored the mocking voice as she tried to figure out which way to go next. She needed to keep her defenses up, and be prepared for the next trap. That memory -while traumatic -had been fairly benign, all things considered. She couldn’t get sucked in as hard in the next one, or she might not be able to pull back out of it.

 

* * *

 

“What do you think, Scott? How many of your memories do you think she’ll go through before she truly understands what a broken disaster you are? That you aren’t worth her time? I do hope she makes it to your time on the streets at least. Who knows? Maybe she’ll even make it to your time with Jack Winters. Wouldn’t that be lovely?”

“Why are you doing this? Why me? What’d I ever do to you?”

Nathaniel ignored him, still watching Jean on the screen as she approached the next door.

“Should I show her your time at the hospital, do you think? The news that your brother was dead? Not much to actually see though,” He added with a laugh. “Maybe we should move her right along to our first session with the glasses. Hmmm…. Choices, choices. What do you think, Scott? Any preferences?”

“ ** _Why_**?!”

Nathaniel looked over at Scott appraisingly, eyes narrowed. “Jean’s good for you, Scott. You actually seem to be developing a backbone to go along with the Summers stubbornness. I’m not sure I like it.”

“You… _tortured_ me for four years. You experimented on me. Tormented me every night. Just tell me why! You owe me that much at least.”

“ _I owe you nothing_! You took _everything_ from me, Scott! Everything I had, everything I loved! And you _dare_ to tell me that I ‘owe’ you anything?!”

Nathaniel took a deep breath, pulling his rage back under control as he stared at the boy.

“You know, perhaps you’re right, Scott. Perhaps I _do_ owe you something. Let’s move this little party along, shall we?”

“Wh… what are you gonna do?”

Nathaniel couldn’t hold back his smile at the fear in the brat’s voice, the wariness that entered his eyes.

“Oh, did you _just_ remember that I control everything in this house? Including the next memory your precious Jean sees? The next disgusting truth she finds out about you? Let’s show her the last time you disobeyed Jack Winters, shall we? Let’s do.”

“No! You… please, don’t! I… I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry.”

“Ah, ah, ah. It’s far too late for that, Scott. Let’s watch it with her, shall we?”


End file.
